HIS ROYAL SECRET
Series: His Royal Secret #1
Genre: Contemporary MM Romance
Author: Lilah Pace
Release Date: July 19, 2016
The first in an enchanting new male/male romantic duology from Lilah Pace, author of Asking for More and Begging for It….
James, the handsome, cosmopolitan Prince of Wales, is used to being in the public eye. But he’s keeping a king-sized secret…James, next in line for the throne, is gay.
He’s been able to hide his sexual orientation with the help of his best friend and beard, Lady Cassandra. Sometimes he feels like a coward for not coming out, but he daren’t risk losing the crown. If he did, the succession would fall on his deeply troubled younger sister, Princess Amelia. To protect her, James is willing to live a lie.
While on holiday, he meets Benjamin Dahan—a rugged international reporter with a globe-trotting, unattached life—who catches far more than James’s eye. And when Ben is transferred to London, it seems fate may finally be smiling on James.
But what began as a torrid fling grows into something far more intimate and powerful. Soon James will have decide who he is, what he wants from life and love, and what he’s willing to sacrifice for the truth…
Take your clothes off.”
“Yes, your Royal Highness.”
I was an instant fan of Lilah Pace the second I read Asking for It. Her writing phenomenal, the story provocative, and the characters multi layered. When I saw that she has a bran new MM romance in the works with a dash of the forbidden (a secretly gay Prince of Wales? *gasp*)
My ovaries were all, sign us up for that right meow!
Then I started reading it and they were all
“when does this pick up?”
“That was pretty hot, but I barely popped a lady boner at it.”
“Alright, I’m over the sex, what about more story?”
“How much longer?”
“Really? We’re not even at 65% yet?”
“Huh. Maybe the next book will bring more”
Clearly my ovaries are fickle bitches. Le sigh. What can I say? This story very sadly left me quite a bit underwhelmed.
While I loved Ben and James individually, together they were barely lukewarm for me. Perhaps that was because I kept wishing for more story development that kept getting overshadowed by all the sex? Perhaps it was because the book read fairly mundane even if it did have a forbidden romance thing going for it. I just wasn’t feeling it.
I was pushing myself to finish…and pushing myself…and pushing myself some more. Eventually this began to feel like the longest short book.
Now don’t get me wrong, in usual Lilah Pace fashion, it was clearly well researched and extremely well written. The author is immensely talented, and that’s clear in her words. What I found lacking here was simply a true connection to the story. But that’s more a personal taste issue than anything truly wrong with the story. Maybe it was my mood, maybe it was something else. But while I didn’t love this one, I will definitely be continuing with the next book because I was intrigued enough by everything going on and the secondary characters to want to know what happens next.
If you’re looking for sizzling hot MM, this book has it. If you’re looking for great secondary characters, this book has it too. If you’re looking for multi-layered characters, this book definitely has it. Who knows, perhaps it will work better for you than it did for me.
Look out for the conclusion
Releasing August 16, 2016
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